On February 15, 2007, three years after its demise, San Francisco Liberation Radio’s (SFLR) case against the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) finally reached the Ninth Circuit Court. This was the station’s third appearance in court, and it unfortunately reached the same conclusion as the previous
two: a decision overwhelmingly in favor of the FCC. A victory would have done nothing in regard to the station’s ability to broadcast, but would have made it more difficult for the FCC to raid and shut down unlicensed microradio stations.

With so few options for the public to
make its voice heard through the media,
many see unlicensed broadcasting
as an act of civil disobedience. A
look at the FCC’s role in radio
raises many questions and contradictions.

SFLR lawyer Mark Vermeulen
argued that the station had operated responsibly as a community-based radio resource, interfering
with no other broadcasters. He
also asserted that the public has
a right to the diversity in content
and that SFLR’s legitimate efforts
to apply for a license were twice
rebuffed.

Although Circuit Judge Clifton interrupted the defense to
ask why a station openly “breaking the law” has any right to be in
court, Senior Circuit Judge Betty
Fletcher feigned sympathy for the
station’s plight. Fletcher noted,
“Congress made it difficult for
people who were the pioneers” by
inserting a provision in the Low
Power FM (LPFM) law banning
access to licensing to any station
that has ever engaged in unlicensed broadcasting. He also suggested
station operators “ought to be lobbying
Congress to change the statute.” Good
advice or bureaucratic shuffle?

The crackdown on microbroadcasting raises many questions: Where is the
due process when the FCC hands down
an ultimatum to either cease broadcasting or pay tens of thousands of dollars in
fines? Who oversees the FCC? Should
the FCC be allowed to operate like an
FBI?

A look at the present state of radio—basically a public-private political oli-
gopoly—finds the FCC presiding over
a mass of contradictions. In 2000, the
FCC voted to issue FM licenses to Low
Power stations after being unable to
eliminate them. While hailed as a victory for the movement, the celebration
was brief. An outraged National Association of Broadcasters (NAB)—an
aggressive industry lobby arm—quickly got Congress to pass a “three band
space” rule requiring several dial spaces
left empty between each FM station to
avoid interference. Based on phony science, it was overturned after a required
study showed no interference. This rule
eliminated about 75 percent of the potential LPFM dial spaces and the “bad
pirate” rule eliminated all existing unlicensed broadcasters forever.

In late 2006, the Future of Music
Coalition updated a study first commissioned in 2002 supporting the need to
fight further media consolidation. Before the Clinton Administration’s 1996
deregulation bill, a radio station could
own a maximum of 24 stations nationwide. Clear Channel Communications
owned over 1200 stations by 2002 as a
result of the legislation. The study indicates the number of companies owning stations peaked in 1995 and has
declined dramatically since, as have
jobs in radio. Between 1995 and 2005,
holdings of the ten largest companies
increased by over 15 times! Local ownership declined from 97 percent to 70
percent, with most of the new licenses
going to the big ten, including “repeater” stations, a transmitter that repeats
the signal of another radio station; most
are used to fill out or extend the broadcasting of an existing radio station.

In addition to the problematic situation of a few conglomerates controlling
the bulk of information on the airwaves,
music fans are also losing out. The
original 2002 study highlighted a “twin
bottleneck” in which the
ten radio companies interact with the five largest
record companies for 80
to 100 percent of songs
played, with local artists
completely shut out. The
dial has become a nationalized corporate jukebox
with virtually no news, repetitive Top 40 music, and
more commercials and
computerized announcer
voices. The “non-commercial” FM spectrum
space is dominated by
NPR, funded and tightly content-controlled
through grants from the
federal government’s
Corporation for Public
Broadcasting. NPR continues to build an empire,
buying up college and
other independent stations that can cash in for
millions of dollars for the
band space.

What about the FCC’s last attempt
at deregulation? The entire campaign
was based on the premise that more
consolidation brings more local programming. It has since come to light
that the FCC’s own study, suppressed
and ignored, shows just the opposite.
Millions of people contacted the FCC
with over 98 percent opposed to the
deregulation that was passed and later
overturned in court. Payola continues
as a standard industry practice, reportedly far beyond the scope uncovered by
a recent New York State Attorney General’s investigation. Radio listenership
has declined 22 percent from its peak in
1989. Is this the result of more media choices or just
bad radio?

Then there’s the media democracy
movement lobbying against further
attempts to deregulate media. Eliminating the “three band space” rule
and filling the dial spaces with “legal”
LPFM stations will only make the current unlicensed broadcasters extinct by
eliminating unused frequencies. The
entire LPFM licensing bill is targeted
at non-profit organizations, with most
of the licenses going to churches in
small, rural markets. The few broadcasters who do get on have to follow the
same self-censorship process as others
to avoid arbitrary, excessive FCC fines
intended to drive them off the airwaves.
Meanwhile, Clear Channel shock jocks
continue to inflame problems such as
racism, sexism, and homophobia, and
some have even sponsored pro-war rallies. Do these corporate lackeys have the
sole right to define public discourse?

Unlicensed “pirates” have little inter-
est in limiting themselves to corporate-sponsored models of polite speech or to
stay within liberal/progressive political
discourse. “Advocacy journalism,” in
which broadcasters choose content as an
activist tool, is under attack as we read
insulting corporate newspaper debates
about whether or not local journalists
such as Sarah Olsen and Josh Wolf
have any legal rights because they are
not employed by a big media company.
Activists want to go beyond the liberal/progressive limits on issues and pro-
gram radical politics. Music programmers want to play all kinds of music, as
they and listeners want less repetitive
formats and more local music played.
Independent programmers do not want
play lists, station managers, fund-raising bureaucrats, or government officials
telling them what and they can and
cannot broadcast.

The corporate-government powers
are naturally afraid of losing advertising
revenues, but political motivations are
obvious despite continued FCC denials.
SFLR started broadcasting in the early
90s, along with Free Radio Berkeley in
the East Bay, to report on the criminalization of the homeless in San Francisco—a population that had absolutely no
voice in the media.

In 2002, SFLR moved to a location high in the hills above the Castro,
expanding its signal and broadcasting hours to provide clear listening for
the central and south parts of the city.
When the bombing and occupation of
Iraq started in 2003, SFLR provided
numerous independent anti-war voices while a licensed radio broadcaster
was fired for uttering a word against
it. Indymedia activists assisted with a
nightly news show otherwise relegated
to the web. As activists shut down San
Francisco for a day with street protests,
web-based Enemy Combatant Radio
initiated internet broadcasts in real time
with cell phone call-ins describing the
street actions. SFLR broadcast this for
several days, and other micro stations
outside the area were able to stream it,
allowing activists with Indymedia stations around the world able to tune in
live via the web.

Another example of the organizing
potential for radio is community members in Oaxaca, Mexico using radio
to rally solidarity among US activists.
Freak Radio Santa Cruz has done phone
interviews with activists directly from
Oaxaca, as well as direct reports from
immigrant actions around California.
Berkeley Liberation Radio provides a
platform for homeless activists. Imagine
the possibilities if every town and every
Independent Media Center had a right
to dial space? What if activists had access to airwaves for event-specific coverage—such as when Houston-based
activists set up a public service broadcast in the Astrodome after the New
Orleans tragedy? Can people-to-people
communications happen outside of the
Internet without the filter of corporations and government agencies?

SFLR chose to engage the authorities
and got nothing. They have not broad-
cast on the airwaves for over three years.
Since then, Pirate Cat Radio (87.9FM)
and West Add Radio (93.7FM) have left
the SF airwaves after receiving written
FCC threats, leaving the city without a
microradio station. Berkeley Liberation
Radio and Freak Santa Cruz continue
broadcasting in their respective towns
despite threatening notices and armed
raids. The FCC has announced another
deregulation process with a bad LPFM
component. Several bills have been debated in Congress for LPFM access not
under control of the FCC, but none
have made it to a full Congressional
vote, and the FCC continues dragging
its heels on licensing stations. Meanwhile, real microradio continues as an
act of civil disobedience.